Tuesday, June 28, 2016

Barnes & Noble Preparing to Offer Booze and Better Food in Stores

Would you be more likely to make Barnes & Noble bookstores a regular stop if you could have a nice dinner, including your choice of beer, wine, or a mixed drink, as part of your visit? Well, Barnes & Noble seems to be counting on just that.According to Fortunemagazine, four Barnes & Noble "concept stores" offering that opportunity are set to open some time during 2017:

The first store will open in Eastchester, N.Y., about 30 miles north of New York City, in October and have amenities like a fire pit and bocce court. The three other stores will be in the Galleria Edina in Edina, Minn.; the Palladio at Broadstone mall in Folsom, Calif.; and One Loudoun, a mixed-use community in Loudoun County, Va.

The company's Nook business has been a drain on its profits and growth strategy almost since the beginning. That has not stopped B&N, however, from straying farther and farther from its core business of selling...you know...books ever since. As regular customers of B&N know from their own eyes, less and less floorspace is devoted to books all the time - and more and more to things like puzzles, superhero figurines, vinyl record albums, and the infamous Nook.

Will this latest decision help? Only time will tell, but it looks like Barnes & Noble is already preparing to move the concept well beyond the initial four locations if it does. I noticed that one of my two local B&N stores (in The Woodlands, Texas) applied for a liquor license about 90 days ago, for instance.

If it really happens, please do let me know what you guys think of it. It's an unusual approach to selling books, but if it works...go B&N. I think it's important that they survive all that's happening these days in bookselling - for the good of avid readers who enjoy browsing as part of their book-buying experience.

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